36C24225Q0901.docx

Special Notice Special Notice

GENERAL INFORMATION

Network Contracting Office 2 James J. Peters VA Medical Center 130 West Kingsbridge Road Bronx NY 10468-3904

POINT OF CONTACT*

Contract Specialist Tiffany Vazquez-Simon tiffany.vazquez-simon@va.gov

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

AGENCY’S URL

URL DESCRIPTION

EMAIL DESCRIPTION

DESCRIPTION

PSC: U005 – Education/Training- Tuition/Registration/Membership Fees

SOL: 36C24225Q0901

DUE: August 05, 2025 10:00AM ET

SET ASIDE: N/A

NAICS: 813920 – Professional Organizations / Size Standard $23.5 Million

POP: 09/01/2025 – 08/30/2026

AGENCY: VA Albany Healthcare System at 113 Holland Avenue Albany, NY 12208.

POC: Tiffany Vazquez-Simon, Contract Specialist tiffany.vazquez-simon@va.gov

DESCRIPTION: NOTICE OF INTENT TO AWARD A SOLE SOURCE CONTRACT TO AMERICAN COLLEGE OF SURGEONS

Market research was conducted and determined that AMERICAN COLLEGE OF SURGEONS is the only vendor capable of meeting the requirement at VA Albany Healthcare System.

This Notice of Intent is not a request for Proposals or Quotations. No solicitation document exists, and no telephone or email inquiries will be accepted. No contract award will be made on the basis of proposals, or quotations received in response to this notice. The government MAY consider all Expressions of Interest (EOI) received prior to August 05, 2025 10:00AM ET.

A determination by the Government not to compete this proposed contract based upon responses to this notice is solely within the discretion of the Government.

Information received will be considered solely for the purpose of determining whether to conduct a competitive procurement.

Responses to this notice must be emailed to tiffany.vazquez-simon@va.gov and received by August 05, 2025 10:00AM ET. Submitters are responsible for ensuring their EOI reaches the designated contracting officer on time.

See attached Statement of Work below for additional details.

If you have any questions or concerns, please contact contract specialist tiffany.vazquez-simon@va.gov.

STATEMENT OF WORK (SOW) - Draft

1. Contract Title: Commission on Cancer Accreditation Fee, Annual Fee

2. Background: The American College of Surgeons’ Commission on Cancer is a consortium of professional organizations dedicated to improving survival and quality of life for cancer patients through standard-setting, prevention, research, education, and the monitoring of comprehensive quality care. This history of the Commission on Cancer and standards for cancer care begins with the American College of Surgeons (ACoS). From its creation in 1913, the ACoS has focused on improving the care of the surgical patient through the advancement of surgical skills and physician education. Because surgical intervention was the only available treatment for cancer at that time, it is logical that the ACoS also took the lead to improve cancer care by establishing the Commission on the Treatment of Malignant Diseases (Committee) in 1922. Over time, the Committee has transformed from its original surgical focus to one that involves all aspects of cancer care. In order to recognize this transformation, the name of the Committee was changed to the Commission on Cancer in the mid-1960s.

The initial work was focused on establishing cancer clinics within hospitals where patients could expect to receive consistent diagnostic and cancer treatment services. By 1930, the first set of standards had been developed and released, and an Approvals Program (Accreditation Program) had been established that evaluated a cancer clinic’s performance against the standards. By 1933, 140 clinics had gained accreditation. Since accreditation of this initial group, the number of Accredited Programs has slowly and steadily increased to encompass more than 1,500 hospitals, freestanding cancer centers, and cancer program networks nationwide. CoC-accredited programs represent 30% of the general medical-surgical hospitals in the United States and Puerto Rico and provide care to close to 70% of patients who are newly diagnosed with cancer each year. Veterans Health Administration (VHA) presently has 60 CoC accredited cancer programs.

3. Scope: The contractor shall provide all labor, travel, and lodging to evaluate and accredit the Albany Stratton VAMC Cancer program during survey years. A member of the cancer committee will confirm the agenda for the survey with the site visit reviewer(s) at least 14 days before the on-site visit. The site visit reviewer’s role is to define the standards and verify that the cancer program is in compliance.

To accomplish this task on the day of the site visit, the site visit reviewer(s) will

· Meet and provide education to key members of facility administrative leadership on the value of CoC accreditation and how to market this achievement.

· Meet the cancer committee to discuss the activities and responsibilities of the cancer committee in relationship to the cancer program and to verify the accuracy of the data recorded in the PRQ.

· Attend a cancer conference to observe the program’s multidisciplinary patient management and discussions.

· Meet with the Cancer Liaison Physician to discuss the his or her role and responsibilities, including opportunities to use National Cancer Database data.

· Meet with the Cancer Program Director and cancer registry representatives to discuss cancer registry functions and cancer committee operations.

· Review medical records to determine relevant standard compliance.

4. Scope of Survey The review process will specifically include the following items:

Eligibility requirements:

1. Review and assess cancer committee responsibilities

2. Facility accreditations

3. Cancer committee authority documents

4. Cancer conference policies

5. Oncology nursing leadership

6. Cancer registry policies and procedures

7. Diagnostic imaging availability

8. Radiation oncology services

9. Systemic services

10. Clinical trial information and education

11. Psychosocial services availability and referral patterns

12. Rehabilitation services

13. Nutrition services

Specific standards for accreditation:

1. Physician credentials

2. Cancer committee membership

3. Cancer committee attendance

4. Cancer committee meetings

5. Goals established

6. Cancer registry quality control plan

7. Monitoring cancer conference activity

8. Monitoring community outreach

9. Clinical trials accrual

10. Annual educational activity

11. Cancer registrar education

12. Public reporting of outcomes

13. College of American Pathologists’ protocols

14. Nursing care

15. Risk assessment and genetic testing and counseling

16. Palliative care services

17. Patient navigation

18. Psychosocial distress screening

19. Survivorship care plan

20. Prevention program

21. Screening program

22. CLP responsibilities

23. Accountability measures

24. Quality improvement measures

25. Assessment of evaluation and treatment planning

26. Studies of quality

27. Quality improvements

28. Cancer registrar credentials

29. Abstracting timeliness

30. Follow-up of all patients

31. Follow-up of recent patients (within 5 years)

32. Data submissions to the National Cancer

33. Data Base 5.6 Accuracy of data

34. Commission on Cancer special studies

5. Specific Technical Elements: N/A

6. Performance Monitoring: Accreditation Membership & Survey

7. Security Requirements: The contractor, their personnel, and their subcontractors shall be subject to the Federal laws, regulations, standards, and VA Directives and Handbooks regarding information and information system security as delineated in this contract.

a. Information made available to the contractor or subcontractor by VA for the performance or administration of this contract or information developed by the contractor/subcontractor in performance or administration of the contract shall be used only for those purposes and shall not be used in any other way without the prior written agreement of the VA. This clause expressly limits the contractor/subcontractor's rights to use data as described in Rights in Data- General, FAR 52.227-14(d) (1).

b. VA information should not be co-mingled, if possible, with any other data on the contractors/subcontractor’s information systems or media storage systems in order to ensure VA requirements related to data protection and media sanitization can be met. If co-mingling must be allowed to meet the requirements of the business need, the contractor must ensure that VA’s information is returned to the VA or destroyed in accordance with VA’s sanitization requirements. VA reserves the right to conduct on site inspections of contractor and subcontractor IT resources to ensure data security controls, separation of data and job duties, and destruction/media sanitization procedures are in compliance with VA directive requirements.

c. Prior to termination or completion of this contract, contractor/subcontractor must not destroy information received from VA, or gathered/created by the contractor in the course of performing this contract without prior written approval by the VA. Any data destruction done on behalf of VA by a contractor/subcontractor must be done in accordance with National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) requirements as outlined in VA Directive 6300, Records and Information Management and its Handbook 6300.1 Records Management Procedures, applicable VA Records Control Schedules, and VA Handbook 6500.1, Electronic Media Sanitization. Self-certification by the contractor that the data destruction requirements above have been met must be sent to the VA Contracting Officer within 30 days of termination of the contract.

d. The contractor/subcontractor must receive, gather, store, back up, maintain, use, disclose and dispose of VA information only in compliance with the terms of the contract and applicable Federal and VA information confidentiality and security laws, regulations and policies. If Federal or VA information confidentiality and security laws, regulations and policies become applicable to the VA information or information systems after execution of the contract, or if NIST issues or updates applicable FIPS or Special Publications (SP) after execution of this contract, the parties agree to negotiate in good faith to implement the information confidentiality and security laws, regulations and policies in this contract.

e. The contractor/subcontractor shall not make copies of VA information except as authorized and necessary to perform the terms of the agreement or to preserve electronic information stored on contractor/subcontractor electronic storage media for restoration in case any electronic equipment or data used by the contractor/subcontractor needs to be restored to an operating state. If copies are made for restoration purposes, after the restoration is complete, the copies must be appropriately destroyed. C-2 MARCH12, 2010 VAHANDBOOK6500.6 APPENDIX C

f. If VA determines that the contractor has violated any of the information confidentiality, privacy, and security provisions of the contract, it shall be sufficient grounds for VA to withhold C-3 MARCH12, 2010 VAHANDBOOK6500.6 APPENDIX C payment to the contractor or third party or terminate the contract for default or terminate for cause under Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) part 12.

g. If a VHA contract is terminated for cause, the associated BAA must also be terminated and appropriate actions taken in accordance with VHA Handbook 1600.01, Business Associate Agreements. Absent an agreement to use or disclose protected health information, there is no business associate relationship.

h. The contractor/subcontractor must store, transport, or transmit VA sensitive information in an encrypted form, using VA-approved encryption tools that are, at a minimum, FIPS 140-2 validated.

i. The contractor/subcontractor’s firewall and Web services security controls, if applicable, shall meet or exceed VA’s minimum requirements. VA Configuration Guidelines are available upon request.

j. Except for uses and disclosures of VA information authorized by this contract for performance of the contract, the contractor/subcontractor may use and disclose VA information only in two other situations:

in response to a qualifying order of a court of competent jurisdiction, or

(ii) with VA’s prior written approval. The contractor/subcontractor must refer all requests for, demands for production of, or inquiries about, VA information and information systems to the VA contracting officer for response. The Albany VA Medical Center Privacy Officer should be informed any time that the contractor discloses PHI outside of the VA.

k. Notwithstanding the provision above, the contractor/subcontractor shall not release VA records protected by Title 38 U.S.C. 5705, confidentiality of medical quality assurance records and/or Title 38 U.S.C. 7332, confidentiality of certain health records pertaining to drug addiction, sickle cell anemia, alcoholism or alcohol abuse, or infection with human immunodeficiency virus. If the contractor/subcontractor is in receipt of a court order or other requests for the above mentioned information, that contractor/subcontractor shall immediately refer such court orders or other requests to the VA contracting officer for response.

l. The contractor will implement appropriate administrative, physical, and technical safeguards and controls to protect PHI and document applicable policies and procedures to prevent any use or disclosure of PHI other than as provided by this contract.

m. Contractor shall comply with VHA Directive 1605.01 (7/24/2023). The contractor shall not take any action in response to a Veteran’s request for access, amendment, request restriction, or accounting of disclosure and shall direct the individual to contact the Privacy Officer at the Albany VA Medical Center.

n. The following training must be taken prior to the contractor having access to PHI. All contractor employees and subcontractors participating under this contract are required to complete the VA's Privacy and Information security training requirement - “VA Privacy and Information Security Awareness and Rules of Behavior Training” - TMS Code “10176” as well as “VA Privacy and HIPAA Training” - TMS Code “10203” prior to having access to PHI. Contractors will set up a TMS account and choose the COR as their supervisor in their TMS account. Contractors must provide certifications of completion to the COR for both trainings during each year of the contract. Training expires 365 days after the training is taken. This requirement is in addition to any other training that may be required of the contractor and subcontractor(s). The COR for the contract is responsible for ensuring the contractor has access to TMS to take training and to follow up with the annual requirements. Failure to complete the mandatory annual training for Rules of Behavior and VA Privacy and HIPAA Training annually, within the timeframe required, is grounds for suspension or termination of all physical or electronic access privileges and removal from work on the contract until such time as the training and documents are complete.

o. The term “security incident” means an event that has, or could have, resulted in unauthorized access to, loss or damage to VA assets, or sensitive information, or an action that breaches VA security procedures. The contractor/subcontractor shall immediately notify the COTR and simultaneously, the designated ISSO and Privacy Officer for the contract of any known or suspected security/privacy incidents, or any unauthorized disclosure of sensitive information, including that contained in system(s) to which the contractor/subcontractor has access.

p. If VA determines that the contractor has violated any of the information confidentiality, privacy, and security provisions of the contract, it shall be sufficient grounds for VA to withhold payment to the contractor or third party or terminate the contract for default or terminate for cause under Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) part 12.

q. The Contractor agrees to comply with the Privacy Act of1974 (the Act) and the agency rules and regulations issued under the Act in the design, development, or operation of any system of records on individuals to accomplish an agency function. In the event of violations of the Act, a civil action may be brought against the agency involved when the violation concerns the design, development, or operation of a system of records on individuals to accomplish an agency function, and criminal penalties may be imposed upon the officers or employees of the agency when the violation concerns the operation of a system of records on individuals to accomplish an agency function. For purposes of the Act, when the contract is for the operation of a system of records on individuals to accomplish an agency function, the Contractor is considered to be an employee of the agency.

8. Government-Furnished Equipment (GFE)/Government-Furnished Information (GFI): N/A

9. Other Pertinent Information or Special Considerations: N/A

10. Risk Control: N/A

11. Place of Performance: Albany Stratton VAMC 113 Holland Ave Albany NY 12208

12. Period of Performance: September 01, 2025 – August 30, 2026

13. Contract Type: Firm Fixed Price.

Special Notice